This specification relates to search engines.
As the amount of information available on the Internet has dramatically expanded, users have had an increasingly difficult time formulating effective search queries for locating specific, relevant information. In recent years, competition among search engine providers has caused an explosive acceleration in the evolution of search engine algorithms, as well as in the user interfaces that are used to display search results.
Various mechanisms can be used to provide queries to a search engine. For example, a user may type a query explicitly into a search box using a keyboard on a computing device and may then submit the query. Queries may also be implicit, such as by a user panning around a map that is displayed on their computing device, and queries being sent to display annotation information for businesses in the area of the map. In addition, users may enter queries by speaking them, particularly when using mobile devices (e.g., smartphones or app phones) for which keyboards may be small or hands-free operation may be important.